What is Love Language? 

Marriage counselor Gary Chapman was the first person to introduce the idea of Love languages in his book “ The Five Love Languages : The Secret to Love That Lasts” published in 1992. According to him “Individuals differ in the ways they express, give and feel love; these different styles of showing and experiencing love are termed as love languages.” 

He further explains that if people show their love in compatibility with their partner’s love languages, their relationships will be more cheerful and content. The five basic love languages introduced were: 

Words of affirmation which are giving positive verbal support to your partner.

Acts of service includes helping out in the chores, being helpful with anything through actions.

Quality time is to prioritize spending expressive, sincere, and meaningful time together.

Physical touch is expressing love with touch such as holding hands, embracing, cuddling etc.

Receiving & giving gifts is to find meaningful gifts for your partner to show your appreciation and affection. 

Why Is It Important to Learn My Love Language? 

It is an established narrative that in order to build happy successful relationships, self awareness is the key. If you want to have long lasting, strong, reliable and content relationships in life you need to be aware of your own  and your partner’s needs. This gives you a better chance of making it work than anything else because if you are able to tell where the problem lies, then you can easily find out the solutions. However, if you and your partner just feel overwhelmed, unseen, unheard and unhappy in your relationship without being able to recognize why, what areas to work on, that means you both lack self-awareness of your own needs in a relationship, along with your partners. 

Most couples go through this after the honeymoon phase when their relationship starts to feel like it is falling apart, they try to make things better but eventually give up because they aren’t doing what’s really required and how that’s required. Here, the love languages play an integral role, if you are aware of and acknowledge your love language, you will be able to express to your partner what are the things they can do to make you feel loved, vice versa you can learn their love language and give them what makes them feel appreciated and cared for. This will help you both develop a strong healthy bond with each other. 

For instance: if one partner’s love language is quality time and they aren’t communicating it to their partner who doesn’t know it, they will spend their time however they see fit and this might make the first partner question their worth or position in their life. They might feel unimportant and not cared for because they aren’t spending enough time together, which genuinely is not the case, the problem lies in the gap of communication. For one partner the time they spend together watching TV or doing chores also counts. However, for someone who’s love language is “quality time,” “undivided attention” is important and they will feel like they’re missing out on their time together as a couple.

Hence, it’s important to learn your own and your partner’s love languages because it helps you to consciously make choices, take actions to express love. Consequently making you feel genuinely content in your relationship. 

It also helps in reducing the frequency of fights because there will be less overthinking and worrying, with more of a mutual understanding and acknowledgment that you both are different individuals with different needs of giving and receiving love that you both express and show love differently. 

Also, It fulfills your emotional needs, makes you feel seen, heard and validated if your partner is aware of your love language and that’s only going to happen if you are self-aware and communicate it openly. 

Research shows couples who are aware of their own and partner’s love languages have more satisfactory & happy relationships and sexual intimacy (Mostova et al, 2022). 

Knowing your love language is also important to assess if you and your partner are compatible for a long term relationship.

And if you are single, it’ll give you a good idea of what kind of person you are looking for and what efforts and gestures you want from your partner to  have a fulfilling relationship. 

How to Figure Out my Love Language 

Now you must be wondering how I can find out my love language or languages. There are many fun quizzes and information available online that you can use to figure out what your emotional needs are and how you like to express love. A quiz you can take to find out your love language can be found here.

In a nutshell, being self-aware and observant of your own emotional needs helps you to express them effectively to your partner, which in turn enhances your communication and relationship quality. Simply put, you will feel loved if you clearly know what makes you feel loved. 

References 

Mostova, O., Stolarski, M., & Matthews, G. (2022). I love the way you love me: Responding to a partner’s love language preferences boosts satisfaction in romantic heterosexual couples. PloS one, 17(6), e0269429. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0269429